Finding An Answer
by Spadefire
Summary: Raimundo is not at all happy to have Emma at the Temple, but what can he do? Apparently, tick her off. But her reaction surprises even the Dragon of Wind, who maybe didn't know her as well as he thought.  NOT a RaiOc, I promise.  R&R!


**Obviously, Emma and Raimundo were not the best of friends. Over time, they overcame their differences, (well, Raimundo got over there being another girl on the team,) and became close friends, but they were a far cry from pals at the start. So, just a little bit of what they started out as- it's before the other stories in here. Anyway, I digress. I don't own Xiaolin Showdown or the riddle; that's the respective genius of Christy Hui and Trenton Lee Stewart. I own Emma and mah story (and maybe the pantless idea.) Enjoy!**

"Hey, Emma, can I talk to you for a second?" Raimundo asked. Emma looked up at him- or rather, down, because she was hanging by her knees from the branches of the old, gnarled tree in the courtyard. Raimundo noticed that her face looked very red from all the blood rushing the wrong way, though she seemed perfectly fine otherwise.

"Hi, Rai! Sure thing." When she didn't move, Raimundo glanced around. "Um, are you gonna get down, or…?"

"Well, I would, but I'm stuck." Raimundo looked up and realized that she was right. The left leg of her pants was snared on a broken limb, and if she tried to jump down on her own, her pants would either rip or be torn off entirely. "As much as I've wanted to try that, 'No shirt, no shoes, no service' thing, I don't want to do it here."

"No shoes- what are you talking about?" Raimundo asked, growing more and more irritated by the second.

"Y'know, that thing restaurants and gas stations and stuff put on their doors. No shirt, no shoes, no service. So it stands to wonder, can you go in there wearing a shirt and shoes but no pants? After all, they don't say anything about pants."

"I- but- you-" the Brazilian just resigned himself and shook his head. "Right. Yeah, sure, whatever. Anyway, I needed to talk to you about something."

"Alrighty then. Shoot," Emma said, no less cheerful than she had been a moment before.

"Why are you still here?" Either Emma was taking a moment to process the question or hadn't heard him due to the roar of blood in her ears.

"Why am I still here." When the Irish girl repeated it, it was a statement, not a question. Her eyes fogged over slightly, and her expression turned to one of immense concentration. After a few moments, she blinked back into the present and glanced at Rai. "Well, if you must know, it certainly isn't for the food."

"Emma, take this seriously!" Raimundo barked, trying his best to keep calm. He didn't like having another jokester in the group, especially when it meant that his own pranks could be somewhat nullified by hers. While he had to admit that she had, on occasions, been incredibly helpful, she was often both a hindrance and an annoyance. Raimundo was simply the only person to see that. "You keep holding us back because you never take the time to take anything seriously and you can't fight like us! You haven't even gotten full control of your backwards magic! You haven't even gotten _partial_control! And even with your magic out of the equation, you never stop to think over a decision, you always lose your temper and you constantly spout nonsense! We keep losing Showdowns because of you and it's a wonder to me that you haven't figured this out and _gone__home__already!_"

Emma's smile faded and her brow furrowed. Then her expression went altogether dark, and she pulled herself back up. This surprised Raimundo, who knew that physically, she was stronger than Jack marginally at best. Carefully, she shimmied her pant leg off of the limb, leaving only a hole and a scratch on her leg that she would most likely forget about. She leapt down and brushed herself off, turning to face Raimundo. He suddenly felt nervous when he saw exactly how dark her expression had gotten.

"Listen," she hissed, jabbing him in the chest, "I don't know what I did to you, but back off, okay? I've been working my hardest to contribute to this team, and everybody seems to get that but you. I don't really care if you're the leader; just because you've got a problem with me doesn't mean I have to go home crying. I try to keep the mood light because of all the stress of my training, which, as you know, is hard for someone who's so far behind you guys, the stress from my studies, in which I'm also way behind you guys in, and my chores, which are a lot more than what I'm used to."

"Well, excuse me if the little rich girl doesn't know how to _wash__dishes_," Raimundo sneered. He hadn't really thought about what he was going to say, but the words had just come out. Since he wasn't exactly in the lap of luxury growing up, Emma's wealth did nothing but irk him more.

Her face contorted, like she was trying to decide whether or not to pummel him or run away crying. Then her face went slack, and she stepped away from Rai. She tilted her head so that the sun glinted off of her glasses and made her eyes invisible. He wondered where she'd learned to do that. "You wanna know why I haven't left yet? Okay. Fine. But if you haven't realized it already, I'm not letting you know the easy way. In the words of the great Nicholas Benedict…

_The answer to this riddle has a hole in the middle_

_And some have been known to fall in it._

_In tennis it's nothing, but it can be received, _

_And sometimes a person may win it._

_Though not seen or heard it may yet be perceived_

_Like princes or bees it's in clover._

_The answer to this riddle has a hole in the middle_

_And without it one cannot start over._

Figure it out, Raimundo." And with that, she stormed off.

Raimundo was confused, to say the least. He had expected a full-blown confrontation, something that could get a negative reaction so that maybe she would get in trouble. But a riddle? As it seemed to be with Emma, as soon as you thought you could predict her, it turned out you hadn't even scratched the surface. The weird, freaky surface. Still, he had a riddle to solve, and he knew perfectly well that he didn't have the patience or the right mindset for riddles. That was- well, actually, that was Emma. She loved puzzles, mainly because she had a knack for figuring out oddities…, which explained the riddle instead of an outright attack, at the least. Maybe she really was learning a little self-control.

"Maybe. And maybe… I should ask Kimiko about it." So Raimundo set off to do just that. He found Kimiko a few minutes later, sitting where he figured she would be; on her pallet in her room, playing the latest Goo Zombie game. "Hey, Kim, I got a question for you," he said, leaning on the doorframe.

"Sure thing," she said, pausing her game and turning around. He sat opposite her, crossing his legs as well. "What's the question?"

"It's actually a riddle." He relayed it to Kimiko, who frowned and scratched her chin.

"Y'know, unless you've spontaneously developed a love of puzzles, this doesn't sound like something you'd ask me. It sounds more like-" she blinked. "Like Emma. Are you two having a competition or something?"

"You could say that," Raimundo replied, relieved to have an excuse made up for him. "In any case, I'm no good at this kinda thing, and since we're allowed to phone a friend…"

"Gotcha. Though I'm surprised you chose me. Isn't Clay better at all this poetry stuff?"

"I, uh, just thought I'd cover all my bases, starting with you. I mean, you never know, right?"

"Oh, okay. Well, let me think. A hole in the middle… a donut? No, that doesn't fit anything else. If it's got a hole and people fall in it, maybe it's a trap?" she murmured.

"That makes sense, but it doesn't add up with the parts about tennis and clover," Raimundo said, shaking his head. "If it's not seen or heard, could it be something invisible? Like, the Shroud of Shadows?"

"Well, yes, but that only adds up with part of the riddle. It seems most of the answers are doing that." Kimiko tapped her knee with one well-manicured finger. "Hmm. It could be a Shen Gong Wu, but I strongly doubt that. No Wu match the riddle all the way."

"There's one part to it I don't get, though," Raimundo said. "Like princes or bees, it's in clover. How are princes and bees anything alike, and what does clover have to do with either of them?"

"Don't bees really like clover for its scent or something? Pollination, maybe. In any case, I know for sure that bees are in clover just because they really like it. As for princes, I don't know. You'd probably be better off asking Clay, or maybe even Master Fung." Raimundo nodded, thanked her for her trouble, and left.

Clay was taking a nap by the little stream in the meditation garden when Raimundo found him. Though the Shoku Warrior was tempted to kick a wave of water at the peacefully slumbering Texan, he decided it wouldn't really make Clay want to help him. So he just nudged Clay with his foot until, with a start, his friend woke up.

"Wh-wha- wha's goin on?" Clay slurred, still half-asleep as he sat up in alarm. His hat, which had been tipped over his eyes, fell to the ground. "Somethin' wrong?"

"No, but I do need your help," Raimundo replied. After a short explanation, Clay got over his annoyance at being woken and paused to mull over the riddle. "The 'in clover' part has got me confused. I get the bee part, but not the prince part. And how can you receive something if it's nothing? And why mention tennis?"

"Well, 'in clover' is a sayin' fer rich folk," Clay explained, tugging on his hat. "If yer in clover, yer in money. So that'd explain th' part about princes, Ah reckon."

"Okay, so bees are in clover because they like it so much and princes are in it because they're rich, and I guess the connection is that princes like money, too. Both in clover because they like it. Got that part, but how does liking money or clover correspond with anything else?" Raimundo asked in frustration.

"Yer lookin' at this th' wrong way. If ya wanna solve a math equation, ya don't jus' plug in random numbers. Ya start from the beginnin' an' go to th' end." Raimundo nodded, supposing that the older boy had a point. "Ah've figgered it out, but Ah think it's best to just help ya."

"What? No! Tell me," Raimundo pleaded, but Clay wouldn't budge. After a few minutes of pestering him for an answer, Raimundo sighed and decided just to go along with it. "Ugh, fine. Starting at the beginning. What has a hole in the middle that you can fall in? Other than a trap, I don't see anything."

"That's 'cause you ain't takin' it like a riddle," Clay said, with no small degree of exasperation. "Maybe it ain't a physical kinda fall. Maybe it's jus' a sayin', like th' 'in clover' bit."

"Okay. So, something that you metaphorically fall in. In tennis, it's nothing, but can be received… a net? A net has holes in it! Oh, but wait, clover, right… jeez, this is hard."

"Then ignore the tennis part fer th' time bein'. You can win it, but ya cain't hear it or see it. Without it, ya cain't start over."

"A goodbye? No, no, a hello? No, those aren't it either." Raimundo hit himself on the forehead in annoyance. "Ugh! Why would Emma give me a riddle she knew I couldn't solve?"

"Ah don't think she did," Clay replied, now amused at Raimundo's frustration. "This is Emma we're talkin' about. She'd have made it hard, yeah, but somethin' you could figure out. Otherwise she probably wouldn't have used this riddle in particular. Anyway," he yawned and laid back down, "Ah have some nappin' to do an' you have some thinkin' to do. It ain't that hard, Rai. In fact, If yer willin' to look, Ah think you'll find it's inside ya." With that final, cryptic statement, Clay closed his eyes and tilted his hat forward, ending the conversation.

Raimundo groaned and considered waking Clay again, but knew that he would just be ignored. So he stood up and set off for a walk through the meditation gardens. It was true; even in her fury, Emma wouldn't have given him a riddle he couldn't solve. Actually, he was starting to feel bad about riling her up so much. He knew that she wasn't proud of her wealth; in fact, she often seemed ashamed of it. And saying that she only held them back wasn't entirely true. Her magic often did a good job of helping them out, and even though she wasn't very good at any kind of fighting, her natural ferocity and penchant for destruction filled the space skill would normally take.

And, truly, she had never been mean to him. Yes, her comebacks were sometimes better than his, and he hated getting pranks pulled on him, seeing as how he was usually the prankster, not the victim, but Emma's pranks were always pretty funny. Plus, she was always a good sport about being the victim herself, or if a prank went awry and she got in trouble. And yes, she did work hard. She trained longer than the rest of them, studied longer than the rest of them, and did almost the same amount of work. (Since she had yet to make Xiaolin Apprentice, her chores were considerably lighter.) Her temper was no more a problem than Kimiko's, and even then it wasn't nearly as explosive. Then again, it was doubtful that there was anybody alive with Kimiko's temper. Her nonsense was simply a result of her fractured mind and childlike personality, and it helped confuse and distract her enemies, which gave the inexperienced Warrior a leg up in combat. All in all, she was definitely a far cry from perfect, but wasn't he? Though Raimundo was loath to admit it, he had been wrong to yell at her, and was starting to deeply regret it.

Of course, he still had a riddle to solve, so he set to it. After mulling over both the riddle and Clay's words, he remembered the original reason Emma had given him the riddle. The answer was the reason she stayed. So it stood to reason that it wasn't an object, though she did enjoy using the Shen Gong Wu to pretend she was Batman. It couldn't be a person, either, since nobody had holes in them or played tennis. There wasn't even a tennis court around. Wait- tennis. "In tennis it's nothing," he murmured to himself as he walked. Suddenly, he remembered a certain term from the sport.

And just as suddenly, everything fit. The hole in the middle, the falling and receiving, the clover and what princes and bees had to do with it. No, it couldn't be seen or heard, (well, he wanted to argue that it could, just not as a physical form,) and one really couldn't start over without it. Once he had the answer, the entire riddle made perfect sense. Just like Clay had said; he did have it in him, and it was kind of like a math problem. It still would've been easier to just know the answer, though.

But then he thought about it being the reason Emma stayed and became confused again. "For all the things she would stay for, why stay because of-" And then it hit him, and he glanced back at the sleeping Texan. He thought about Kimiko, who had quickly become Emma's best friend, Omi, who now regarded Emma as a big sister, and himself, who probably needed to be nicer to Emma. Yes, the answer did make sense. He had just needed to take a look around. And another thing he needed to do was apologize. He had been out of line.

"I forgive you," he whirled around to see Emma hanging from another tree, holding the Mind Reader Conch. She smiled and held out a hand, he sheepishly took it. "I appreciate the thoughts, too. Nice to know you realize that I'm not just another screwball."

"Yeah, well, I shoulda been nicer about the whole thing," Raimundo muttered, scuffing the ground with his sneaker. "How much of that did you pick up, by the way?"

"Enough. Now could you help me get down? I don't think I can pull this one off." Raimundo looked up, and sure enough, this time a thorny branch had snared both pant legs. He sighed and climbed up, trying to untangle the thorns. Several cuts and curses later, Emma would be free and they would go inside for a cold drink and some video games, and maybe they would take the first steps towards friendship.

Then again, they'd probably kill each other first.

**A free cookie and a free oneshot to whoever can figure out the answer to the riddle. If you review and get it wrong, you get to keep the cookie anyway. (I hope I didn't make it too obvious.) And to anyone who's read the Mysterious Benedict Society, no cheating! You are forbidden from guessing. Honors system, people. Best of luck to those who haven't read it, though. Stay tuned!**


End file.
